Movie Review - The Boys are Back

Clive Owen stars as Joe Warr, a recently widowed father in the new film The Boys are Back.  Joe’s a high-profile sports writer in Australia when his wife Katy (Laura Fraser) is suddenly stricken with cancer.  He’s left to raise their young son Artie (Nicholas McAnulty) and Harry (George MacKay), his teenage son from a previous marriage.  Struggling with both grief and the day-to-day mundanity of child-rearing, he strikes upon a “unique” solution: he will only tell his children yes.  On the sliding scale of dumb ideas, it’s one that falls somewhere between Howard the Duck and “New Coke.”  Unfortunately, the movie treats this decision as if it were a visionary stroke of genius. 

As Joe puts this plan into effect, we see his kids having water balloon fights and riding their bikes…both activities taking place inside of the house.  We are also treated to lovingly photographed images of his 7-year old son (I think, they never really confirm his age) riding on the hood of his father’s SUV as they drive down a heavily populated beach.  It’s apparent from the presentation that we’re supposed to find these antics delightfully mischievous.  We see repeated images of outraged, comically furious beachgoers shaking their fists at our “cheeky” movie star.  The problem is that it’s not “delightfully mischievous.”  It’s rude and endangers both his son and the general public.  The film clearly expects us to find this oh-so-adorable.  But if it weren’t for the fact that Joe is being played by the “dreamy” Clive Owen, no one would find his behavior “adorable”, they’d find it “actionable.”

Compounding the problem is the character of Artie.  Again, if the film ever confirms his age, I missed it.  But we see him at school so he’s presumably at least in kindergarten.  However, his dialog and reaction to losing a parent is written as if it were meant to be played by a child two years younger.  It was so off-putting that I spent a good portion of the film trying to determine if Artie was supposed to be special needs.  The end result is that what’s meant to be “cute” is “cloying” and what’s intended to be “endearing” instead becomes “insufferable.”  Artie, on two separate occasions, hits his father during a temper tantrum.  His father’s reaction?  He hugs his son and apologizes (unnecessarily) for causing Artie to lash out with violence.  That’s not how you raise a productive member of society; it’s how you raise a wife-beater.  Artie is intended to be precociously precious when he’s actually a self-centered, narcissistic little brat being spoiled by a self-righteously, self-indulgent father.  And all of it is maddeningly played as if Joe is the epitome of fatherhood.

The film is also vaguely misogynistic.  Excluding the character of his wife, every woman in the film is presented as a hypersensitive, rule-obsessed, overly-cautious shrew.  Time and again we see these women reprimanding him for his new philosophy.  His ex-wife, his mother-in-law and his (sort of) girlfriend all take turns as humorless killjoys at various points in the film.  Literally every woman in the film is portrayed as a joyless harpy with the exception of his wife…and they killed her!

On the upside, it’s set against the backdrop of Australia and beautifully shot.  Both Clive Owen and George MacKay give strong performances.  But those performances are wasted within the confines of a script that is fixated on the sentimental glamorization of some of the worst parenting philosophy short of outright physical abuse. 

On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being Kramer vs. Kramer and 1 being Problem Child 2, The Boys are Back gets a 4.